All posts tagged ‘Cuusoo’

Lego Cuusoo, for those who’ve not heard of it before, is a part of the Lego website where builders can upload photos of their creations. However, it’s not a place to just show off what you can build – if the model gains enough support from the community, and meets a strict set of guidelines, Lego will consider putting it into production as an official set. So far, only three sets have made it into the shops – the Shinkai Submarine (currently going for silly money on Amazon), the Hayabusa satellite and a Minecraft set (both of which are still available via lego.com and Amazon). Continue Reading “Great Scott! Doc Brown’s Delorean Will be Lego Cuusoo’s Next Set” »

In the past few months, I have been reviewing quite a few Lego Cuusoo projects hoping to raise some awareness and votes for some of these geek-worthy creations.

As a space enthusiast and professional, I decided this time to review one of the early Cuusoo creations turned into an official set, the Lego Hayabusa Spacecraft. As a matter of fact, the Hayabusa project was the second project to be selected by the Cuusoo program, which was initiated as a collaboration with the Lego Group in Japan.

A lot of people were up in arms about Lego Friends — unfairly, for the most part. A Lego set is only what you make of it. Still, a lot of people bemoaned how the geekiest set, Olivia’s Inventor’s Workshop, still wasn’t all that elite.

Thanks to the magic of Lego CUUSOO, any set that gets 10,000 votes can be made into an actual Lego product. And what better geek girl inspiration — or geek anyone inspiration — than electrical engineer and open source kitmaker Limor “Ladyada” Fried? The Ladyada’s Workshop CUUSOO model shows an accurate representation of Ladyada’s actual workshop, including a laser cutter, soldering iron, and a pick-and-place machine. It was designed by Bruce Lowell.

For more information, check out the project’s landing page on Adafruit.com, or see this CNET piece about the project.

By now most of our readers have come across the Lego Cuuso site, a place where builders can submit models and people can vote on them. If the model gets 10,000 votes Lego will look into the possibility of making it into an official playset.

I came across this idea by Thomas Lockwood, Cuuso user Tbone_TB1, to build a Firefly Serenity play set. He has already built a small model of Serenity and is proposing a larger model that would accommodate minifigs. He is also planning on these features:

Movable loading ramp

Cockpit capable of fitting 1 minifig

Light up firefly drive

Playable dining area and cargo hold

Rotating engines

As for the minifigs, Thomas has some concept art for Firefly minifigs that look really good. I especially like the Jayne with a ski cap and Wash kind of looked like a minifig already. Speaking of Firefly characters, Morena Baccarin (who played Inara) recently gave the project a boost when she tweeted about it.

To give your support to the project go to the Firefly Playset Cuuso page and vote for it and make sure you scroll down to see the minifigs. To see more photos of the Lego Serenity model check out Thomas’s Gallery over at Brickshelf. He does good work and I wouldn’t mind having my own Serenity to put next to the Millennium Falcon in my china closet.

If you’re a Lego fan and you’ve lurked about the online Lego community for any length of time, there’s an excellent chance you’ve come across Peter Reid’s exo-skeleton minifig model. The design is clearly inspired by the mecha suits that we’ve seen in games, film, and graphic novels for decades now, and Peter’s execution in Lego is nothing short of brilliant. As they say on the internet, “Shut up and take my money!”

Peter has now placed his project up on the Lego Cuusoo site, and he needs your help. As you may recall, Cuusoo allows Lego fans to submit projects for Lego to consider as potential kits. Given the crowd-sourced nature of the site, Peter needs 10,000+ votes for his project to have the Lego Powers-That-Be review his work. Right now, he has a little over 1,000 votes, so we need to show him some GeekDad mouse-clicking love. Get over to Cuusoo and vote, people. And yes, you have to register to vote, but please take the 60 seconds to get through that — it’s worth it!

If you’re interested, Peter’s Flickr account also has many, many more creations to tickle your eyes and brains, so head over there after you’re done voting for him.

The Lego Cuusoo Beta is helping bring some great Lego ideas to light, but none more geeky, educational and clever than the idea of bringing the 8-bit animated goodness of Minecraft to Lego.

A Cuusoo user, ‘koalaexpert,’ has already hit the 3,000+ support mark with his request and beta modelling of what Lego would look like if it created a series based on the extremely popular web-based game, Minecraft. It is really a perfect fit, the 8-bit graphics lend themselves so well to Lego construction and recreation. There are some great example builds of Lego Minecraft at the Cuusoo page. Of course, there would be a whole heap of franchising discussions and legal mumbo jumbo to actually get this concept off the ground, but it has to start somewhere. I’m sure there are some of you diving for the Lego bucket now looking for some grey and brown bricks to begin experimenting with.

And, of course this has sparked a wave of activity. Including the idea from another user for Minecraft Lego bricks. So, is Lego and Minecraft another perfect geek match? The likelihood of this commercializing is small, but I think the Adult Fans of Lego community and a host of others may just start building their own Lego sub genre. So, keep an eye out for any great Lego Minecraft mash ups online and let GeekDad know about them.